


Quiet Storm

by ivyspinners



Category: Emelan - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Angst, F/F, Goldenlake SMACKDOWN
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-15
Updated: 2011-06-15
Packaged: 2019-09-18 17:28:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 345
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16999404
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivyspinners/pseuds/ivyspinners
Summary: After a moment, she let both hands fall. They rested awkwardly on her green tunic, as though unsure what to do without Lark to hold.Rosethorn and the path back from Gyongxe.





	Quiet Storm

Rosethorn's hand opened and closed around empty air.

Lark was gone.

The space where she had been, the garden doorway where Rosethorn grasped uselessly at the echo of her presence, reverberated, as though emptiness could make a sound. For several seconds, Rosethorn stared, uncomprehending. Her other hand rose to her cheek, where Lark had tried to kiss her -- the hand that had lashed out at vivid ghosts of Gyongxe. After a moment, she let both hands fall. They rested awkwardly on her green tunic, as though unsure what to do without Lark to hold.

In the roaring silence, she thought she could hear Lark weeping.

The air was empty; windless and still. Rosethorn could not look at the rows upon rows of roses she had planted, obstinately to guard the windows, but in reality for Lark, to remember her by while she was gone. She just couldn't, though she was being silly and hurtful and those neat beds had become overgrown and wild in her years away.

Resolute, Rosethorn turned her back on the argument.

Lark, Rosethorn realized quickly, had doubled back. In her light-filled workroom, wool fibers twined together between her fingers, spun into threads.

Even in her own workroom, Rosethorn could hear the spinning, could picture Lark's face: quiet, impassive, dried tear tracks streaking her cheeks. Lark's tears were short-lived and fleeting -- like the surprise-turned-shock on her face when Rosethorn snapped and stung at the slightest provocation, searching for a fight with the one person who wouldn't fight back. Right then, Lark's soft comfort wasn't what she'd _needed_ , and she'd wondered, ' _Is this what's waiting for me at home?_ '

She knew, from the moment she began to work, that Lark could hear her jars clinking together. It was, she thought, listening to the whistling spindle, like standing in the same room with their backs turned. They could talk --

The quiet stretched on and on. Only a thin layer of cloth and about ten feet of space separated them -- but though they were almost together, at the same time, Rosethorn and Lark were alone.


End file.
